OreGairu 3 – 05/06

Maybe I am in the minority here, but I am one of those who are still on board with how OreGairu presents and wraps up its conflicts and still think it’s as great as the second season. So before we get into the rap-battle and “one of them grants someone’s wish for someone else” part, let’s just run through what episode 5 & 6 cover. There are a lot of Iroha’s precious moments in these two installments, further cementing her as the near-lead status.

Indeed, when you think of OreGairu’s supporting cast, her presence is shinier than everyone else. And one of the reasons why Iroha’s character works so well is because she has the best dynamic with Hachiman. Not only do they bounce off each other well (like in the conversation they have in episode 6), but like every good relationship Iroha is more of herself when she’s around Hachiman, and that Hachiman’s action can inspire or ignite something in her. Take Hachiman and Yukinon key confrontation at the end of episode 5, for example. Iroha serves merely as a witness to their bonds, or more like Hachiman and Yukinon showing their mutual love to each other – a confession of sorts. What I love about that confrontation is that, just like Iroha, we as the audience witness our main characters making real steps forward in their relationships. 

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Lupin III The Woman Called Fujiko Mine – 4 [Vissi d’arte, Vissi d’amore]

Whew, its been a long wait since my last post on Fujiko Mine, but I have an excuse, I promise. I’ll let you know what it is when I think of it. In the meantime, this episode on Fujiko Mine we see the return of Lupin and Zenigata in a story straight out off the stage! So lets dive right in.

Right off the bat, this episode was nothing like what I was expecting. I figured we would start to see some team-ups, and in a way we got that with Lupin’s return. However the primary focus seemed instead to be on Zenigata and getting him properly introduced to the plot. We met him before of course, all the way back in episode one, but this is our first proper look at him. And what a look it is. This is easily the most misogynistic episode of anime I have seen in awhile, and I can’t tell if Fujiko Mine did it on purpose. So many of Zenigata’s interactions with Fujiko were demeaning or sexual in nature, really just nailing her with sexist jokes/actions over and over. There is probably something in there about lust vs love, considering the episodes topic, but Fujiko Mine really laid it on thick here.

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Lupin III The Woman Called Fujiko Mine – 3 [The Lady and the Samurai]

Welcome to episode 3 of The Woman Called Fujiko Mine! Apologies for the wait on this one. This is the only series I dont have a schedule for so I want to wait to write until I know what to write, if that makes sense. This week, just as I predicted this week we meet Ishikawa Goemon, get a fun train heist and just a liiiiitle bit of romance. Just a tad, I promise. So without further ado, lets dive in!

Starting off, lets talk Goemon, because this man is a complete and total Chuunibyou. The way he acts and over-dramatizes everything, taking it far stricter than the situation calls for, is fun. The way he cuts into the mountain, or does a dramatic flourish as he cuts a hole in the top of the train. He just amps everything up to 11, almost as if just to look cool. But what makes it work is that Goemon himself seems unaware of this. He takes it all incredibly seriously with a great degree of sincerity. And the best part is that unlike a vast majority of the Chuuni archetype, he actually has the skills to back it up. One could argue this disqualifies him from being a Chuuni at all, but for the sake of quick descriptions I think it still fits. Overall, he’s a fun character in this wacky series.

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Lupin III The Woman Called Fujiko Mine – 2 [.357 Magnum]

Its time for another episode of The Woman Called Fujiko Mine! I have to say, its nice to not be on a rigid schedule for once. No weekly showings or anything, just watching and writing when I have the time. Enough about me though, you came here for some Lupin, so lets dive right into it!

Getting into the actual episode, this week we meet Jigen Daisuke, the gunman! I was a bit surprised it wasn’t a follow up involving Lupin in some way. However it looks like rather than following Lupin and Fujiko as a pair, Fujiko Mine is more geared towards Fujiko herself. So she is going to be running the show as we run around meeting all of the core characters of the Lupin III franchise. I am curious then if next week we are going to meet Goemon, or if it will stick to this core trio. We still have plenty of show left to meet the rest of the cast, we are only 2 episodes in. So I think it would be best if Fujiko Mine focused on fleshing out the ones we have now. Either way though I am looking forward to it.

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OreGairu 3 – 03/04 [Iroha Isshiki is the Strongest Junior, as Expected/ By Chance, Yui Yuigahama Thinks of the Future]

Although the episode’s title is about Iroha, the entirety of episode 3 doesn’t really focus on our favorite girl. Instead, week 3 we get to see two more old faces: Hiratsuka-sensei and Saika, in much less significant roles they have in previous seasons. Especially for Saika as we see his usual “antics” with Hachiman and nothing else. Hiratsuka-sensei fares much better, especially in episode 4 as we eventually learn that she’s about to leave school. In OreGairu, along with its sharp dialogues, there is a big focus on characters’ glares and gestures. It’s all about the silence, the brief moment of hesitance which speaks just as powerful those spoken lines and monologues. We see lots of it here, even to side characters like Hiratsuka-sensei. Her gaze and her gentle smile to her Yukinon’s sister inform you a whole lot about their relationship. Or Iroha’s little-but-effective screen time, when we see a deeper and more vulnerable side of her: her fear (or shame?) of using people to get her way, especially towards the ones dear to her.

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Lupin III: The Woman Called Fujiko Mine – 1 [Master Thief vs. Lady Looter]

Welcome all to a very irregular segment for The Woman Called Fujiko Mine. Because of how small this season was, I wanted to fill in our coverage a bit, and thought it was a good opportunity to watch something that’s been on my list for awhile now. And heads up, this series is going to be irregular just as I watch it, so I hope you stick with me, as we watch some Lupin!

Right out the gate, my goodness was that an unexpected amount of titty. I always thought Lupin III was a more… childish show to be frank. An old classic detective show, something more in the Disney style. I assumed things like Goemon’s Spray of Blood being the black sheep of the series. Turns out that was just par for the course, as Fujiko Mine opens with incredible style. Lots of heavy shading and crosshatching, disguising CGI with said shading while at the same time keeping Lupin’s classic character design. The long story short is that Fujiko Mine looks good, like really good. I think Fujiko’s tits are a bit to large myself and show seems to really revel in that sexuality. However overall it visually looked fantastic. I can only hope it keeps this up moving forward because its a nice breath of fresh air in this current season.

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OreGairu 3 – 02 [That Key Was Never Handled Until Today]

There are shows that remind you of specific phases of your life. Either they resonate with you because of the time you watch – like I first watched Tatami Galaxy when I was in uni just like the characters are, or Monogatari series when I was at the time didn’t really know what to do with my life – so Monogatari series was kind of therapy for me; or the shows remind you of specific places where you watched it – like I rewatched Eccentric Family when I was in Kyoto, thus I experienced the settings on a whole new level of appreciation (it’s magical). OreGairu 2 is another example of this. I watched it when it was airing back in 2015 when I was in Cannes. And throughout the midst of movie frenzy and hours waiting in lines, I still squeezed some time to follow it and boy I felt it. I felt the personal struggles Hachiman and the girls have. I felt the same feeling of Hachiman trying to fix things up by sacrificing himself, doesn’t realizing the fact that he hurts the ones who care deeply for him by doing that. 

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BNA – 04-06 [Dropped]

It’s been nearly a week since Asenshi released episode 6 of BNA, but I’ve delayed in writing this post because I wasn’t sure how to approach it. If you’ve read the title, you know I’m dropping the series – but I wondered about my lead-in paragraph. Should I beat the dead horse-shaped argument of completing anime versus dropping it? Should I caution against studio worship, given that Trigger’s reputation caused many viewers (myself included) to set their expectations for the show too high? Or should I lay into the series for being a disappointment on its own terms, which would demand a more thorough breakdown of each episode?

As the week dragged on, I realized that it didn’t really matter what I led with. Most people won’t remember this show in three years, and they’ll certainly have forgotten my posts about it long before then. I haven’t enjoyed the series since its second episode, and I don’t want to watch it or talk about it anymore. This post just needs to be farted out so I can forget about BNA, and continue enjoying the few solid anime this virus-stricken spring season has to offer. So, in the spirit of abandonment, here are my brief thoughts about episodes 4-6.

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Kakushigoto – 03 [Makeshift Circus/ The True State of Manga and Muscles]

The third episode of Kakushigoto leaves me a bit indifferent. This week, Kakushigoto presses hard on its “gags” nature and while that works well in his previous anime adaptations, I feel these skits are a bit random in Kakushigoto. Structure-wise, the show bookends bits of the present day (with more context each time) to its “flashback” that really is our true timeline. So what do we learn in this flashforward this week? That the house the 18-yo Hime visits is their old house before they moved to Nakameguro and that Gotou layouted their new house exactly like this old house. The fact that the house in Nakameguro is on sale now, and with Gotou’s still absent in the flashforward could mean something sad is waiting around the corner. 

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